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24 man channel does not work. The purpose is promoting squad play. Squad play does not happen unless you are in the same channel and it's only one squad.

I guess we could just have stratsquad or whatever. People should know that the amount of silliness is multiplied by 100 in organized comms since there's not about 400 people talking over eachother just relaying intel, so there's room to talk about other shit as well, make friends and generally have much more fun.

When you're playing 12 people tight together everything works better and you learn to know your squadmates. With 48 it's mainly just random jokes and no room for 1on1 talk.

which does remind me: how much fun did the SLs have last night? whenever I talked to Ride, he seemed very grumpy, but I couldnt tell if it was because of me, or because of his growing hatred for enemy AA

"Quantacat's name is still recognised even if he watches on with detached eyes like Peter Molyneux over a cube in 3D space, staring at it with tears in his eyes, softly whispering... Someday they'll get it."

There needs to be space for idiocy and arseing about and mocking Grible, otherwise you take the fun out of the whole thing.

This.

However: I understand there's 30 poeple in a channel is too much for some; whether it's too noisy or just not coordinated enough. Not Wednesdays though; sorry to whoever I gave a straight "no" to the other night on that, but I like Wednesdays to be big & loud. I'd consider splitting into 24 person channels if there was a general agreement on that though.

But, yeah, I can see the appeal of something a bit more like the strategic nights as an ad hoc possibility.

Then the those in commanders would only have to add the "Casual Giraffes" command channel to their whisper list and we'd have a setup where the serious folk could go do their serious stuff and the rest of us can go on taking the piss out of Grible, but still have command coordination with the serious lot?

Think the other SLs did fine, but it was very frustrating getting orders to go somewhere where we could not do anything as air because the ground forces couldn't take out the turrets or other stuff. I know you set WP for their bursters, but the ground never took them out, nor did they saron the turrets. We did fine and had a lot of fun when we for example bombed the sattelites outside the tech plant since that was safe from AA at the time (you had cleared it out). Since AA is so goddamn powerful now, it's extremely easy to create a no fly zone.

When you have an air squad you can't just put them over a tech plant if the ground forces don't snipe the aa turrets. They'll get wiped out. Hence, my frustration. Also, we stayed at a tech plant for like 30-45 minutes and it seemed like you guys didn't advance at all. We were kinda just getting shot down and not really doing much. Yes, I know you asked me if I wanted to switch from air, but we wanted to stay air, just have a viable target. Like Torremar for example, which worked fine. Or the tech plant, if the ground would have taken out the AA.

But I guess none of us really know how to utilize an air squad yet, but I can say that it's probably best the air folks just ask where the ground is heading and they help out if they can. Also, at facilities, to let the ground take out the AA turrets and totally focus on that the first thing you do. That way you can gain air dominance and bomb the hell out of everything and the air squad is super useful again.

And honestly I don't see why we shouldn't run organized comms on standard nights. Is there really so many people that are against it? Last night we were a bit more organized, if drunk, and it was about 500 000 times better then usual. When we just zerg we get jack shit done, when we organize we succeed, help out and are a force to be reckoned with. A reactive zerg is nothing of the sort. We still did not organize the comms, which made squads split up somewhat and people to react slowly, but seeing as we were only about 20 in the channel, we could still get orders out that people listened to. We capped different bases with different squads and in general we were super smooth and swift. We successfully drove TR off Indar.

With 40+ in a chat we will never accomplish anything more then zergin' around. Is that really what people in general want for standard nights? Can't 12 people be enough for idiocy and arseing about? There is certainly a LOT more room for it.

Also it was me you said no to, and wednesday was a clusterfuck commswise, so I quit. But yes, I agree, there must be a night for such things as well.

Think the other SLs did fine, but it was very frustrating getting orders to go somewhere where we could not do anything as air because the ground forces couldn't take out the turrets or other stuff. I know you set WP for their bursters, but the ground never took them out, nor did they saron the turrets. We did fine and had a lot of fun when we for example bombed the sattelites outside the tech plant since that was safe from AA at the time (you had cleared it out). Since AA is so goddamn powerful now, it's extremely easy to create a no fly zone.

When you have an air squad you can't just put them over a tech plant if the ground forces don't snipe the aa turrets. They'll get wiped out. Hence, my frustration. Also, we stayed at a tech plant for like 30-45 minutes and it seemed like you guys didn't advance at all. We were kinda just getting shot down and not really doing much. Yes, I know you asked me if I wanted to switch from air, but we wanted to stay air, just have a viable target. Like Torremar for example, which worked fine. Or the tech plant, if the ground would have taken out the AA.

But I guess none of us really know how to utilize an air squad yet, but I can say that it's probably best the air folks just ask where the ground is heading and they help out if they can. Also, at facilities, to let the ground take out the AA turrets and totally focus on that the first thing you do. That way you can gain air dominance and bomb the hell out of everything and the air squad is super useful again.

And honestly I don't see why we shouldn't run organized comms on standard nights. Is there really so many people that are against it? Last night we were a bit more organized, if drunk, and it was about 500 000 times better then usual. When we just zerg we get jack shit done, when we organize we succeed, help out and are a force to be reckoned with. A reactive zerg is nothing of the sort. We still did not organize the comms, which made squads split up somewhat and people to react slowly, but seeing as we were only about 20 in the channel, we could still get orders out that people listened to. We capped different bases with different squads and in general we were super smooth and swift. We successfully drove TR off Indar.

With 40+ in a chat we will never accomplish anything more then zergin' around. Is that really what people in general want for standard nights? Can't 12 people be enough for idiocy and arseing about? There is certainly a LOT more room for it.

Also it was me you said no to, and wednesday was a clusterfuck commswise, so I quit. But yes, I agree, there must be a night for such things as well.

Thanks for that, I assumed the SLs would take care of the AA on the ground, but maybe I didnt make it sound urgent enough, sorry about that. I dont know if Ill be PL next thursday, but Ill keep it in mind for next time.

Also, thanks for taking over so soon after joining, I had to run. I did get the feeling like we managed to keep the TR at bay on Indar, though. Great work everyone!

"Quantacat's name is still recognised even if he watches on with detached eyes like Peter Molyneux over a cube in 3D space, staring at it with tears in his eyes, softly whispering... Someday they'll get it."

The air war regularly has a different frontline than the ground war. More often than not, you can't just fly to a platoon waypoint and go to work.

For me, it doesn't make sense for a ground-based PL to set specific targets for an air squad. People in the air probably have a better understanding of what is happening, what is possible and should make their own decisions. Especially with the current AA game - pilots have to be ultra cautious.

If the platoon waypoint is swarming with AA, pull away and work in a different hex.

I'd like to apologise to Quanta for last nights shameless begging to take over as PL. I don't mind leading for a little bit in a small platoon, but I'm not confident enough as a leader to do it with a larger group for a prolonged amount of time, but still, sorry.

So here is a purple giraffe of awesome for you, for being awesome and putting up with my whining!

We really did keep the TR at bay, it's just that they came back in full force and pushed us back again.. But, we got Indar at last actually, so I think we did a great job!

And izal has a good point as well - the air squad should probably just roll kind of ad hoc where they want to go and swoop in when the ground tells them they're needed.

Regarding organized comms then.. Should I just have my organized spec-ops-y squad be Delta? Then we'll be Delta Force and all cool and stuff, and focusing on ninjacapping, being behind enemy lines and fighting as a force. Mainly infantry ops. Then we can communicate with quanta, coop or whoever is leading the PL proper.

I really like Coopers idea. At least that way it gives people the option to choose, rather than just having a blanket rule. Which as JesusPhish pointed out might alienate one or two who just play casual wednesdays. Why not give everyone the best of both worlds. I agree with Esoteric, playing in a serious style all the time can get to much. Sometimes i want to just sit there in silence, listen to the rabble and shoot a laser gun.

In terms of Thursday night: Charlie was a pleasure to lead. I had a pretty full squad for basically the entire night which was great. Everyone had a good attitude, suggested things and listened to me when needed. I hope that they enjoyed themselves. As usual an outing full of indelible and memerable moments.

I thought you did a good job Quanta, though at certain points in the night i noticed myself and Orius felt our squads had grinded to a halt, so to speak. That wa sbecause we were either waiting for orders, or the fighting had reached a bit of a stalemate. On the whole there were moments where it felt like we worked really we as a platoon and there were moments where i felt we were quite lonely as a squad. Not to knock your efforts at all, sometimes things just play out like that on outings, so dont take that the wrong way.

I tried out that whole MAX tactic out by the way. At the BioLab when Cooper took over, though it was very spurr of the moment and lacked enough support to last long enough to see results. Though i could certainly see it has great potential.

Last night we were a bit more organized, if drunk, and it was about 500 000 times better then usual. When we just zerg we get jack shit done, when we organize we succeed, help out and are a force to be reckoned with. A reactive zerg is nothing of the sort. We still did not organize the comms, which made squads split up somewhat and people to react slowly, but seeing as we were only about 20 in the channel, we could still get orders out that people listened to. We capped different bases with different squads and in general we were super smooth and swift. We successfully drove TR off Indar.

With 40+ in a chat we will never accomplish anything more then zergin' around. Is that really what people in general want for standard nights? Can't 12 people be enough for idiocy and arseing about? There is certainly a LOT more room for it.

Also it was me you said no to, and wednesday was a clusterfuck commswise, so I quit. But yes, I agree, there must be a night for such things as well.

Do channels need to be changed then?

On most nights we get somewhere between 15-30 people in Mumble. If 20 is a decent number in a single channel, is there any need to change what we currently do?

If so, to what? Would the old Stratgir system fo two 24 people channels work?

I'd rather a system that was ad hoc. Each night can be dfferent. I've been on and there's been 30 of us and it's been pretty tight, other nights 30 people is just, like you say, a messy zerg. Because each night is different, I don't think some kind of system of "if there's more than 20, split" or something like that would work.

The Stratgir set of channels is not going away. All a PL - or anyone else for that matter - needs to do is ask in comms if people would prefer to use that system. If they would, move.

What I want to know is: Do we need a "middle ground". Somewhere between the 12 person channels we have for stratgir and the 30+ channel we have on other nights. If so; what does that middle ground look like, and what does it need on Mumble?

Basically, air frontline is different to ground frontline, the air squad should make its own decisions and treat the platoon waypoint as an ideal rather than an order.

Way-point for air should be the centre point for an area of operation. The only air vehicles that have any justification for staying put are Liberators.

As for an air brigade, you want to really specialise and work out ratios. I think having 2 ESFs to 1 Lib is a good set-up. We also need to make sure with our air escorts that they're set-up for A2A. I don't know how many people in the outfit are though, but even the basic gun is good enough. It does put more pressure on specific units though; Scythes will be very hard to do much against ground with just their main gun. Infantry is fine, but anything heavier than a Lightning and it's a lesson in frustration.

What I want to know is: Do we need a "middle ground". Somewhere between the 12 person channels we have for stratgir and the 30+ channel we have on other nights. If so; what does that middle ground look like, and what does it need on Mumble?

If we need it, can't we just use the stratgir channels and disregarding the actual labels for alpha/bravo/charlie/delta? It should just be a matter of telling who to go where.

As to what went on thursday, I think I'd like to see some more focus on communication between the leaders and reaching an overarching strategy before going at it and reacting to what we find, instead of getting bogged down in an administrative mire where people don't really see the big picture. That goes for getting the SLs more involved in the thought process behind the larger movements instead of being given an objective one after another and having to figure out what the overall process is supposed to be and working together as a whole platoon. I feel this worked a lot smoother the time before this.

I'm not putting the blame square on Quanta, though, at least as far as Bravo was concerned. I'm not entirely sure why it happened this time around, if it was me not being clear enough or something else, but trying to keep the squad together was much harder this time around than it was with Charlie last week. Maybe it was demotivational that we were up against such insane odds at times and made people distrust leadership in general? If there's anything I could do differently at least, I'd love to hear comments on it. But I also feel we were being jerked around a little bit and I understand why that happens, it was just a little disheartening to redirect the guys in my charge up to three or four times and be unable to give them as much a sense of accomplishment as I'd like to.

In conclusion I think communication is still key and is something we should continue to work on. One thing I'd like to see is a little bit more use of the broadcast function so everyone properly understands the PL's general intent and limit confusion.

"Quantacat's name is still recognised even if he watches on with detached eyes like Peter Molyneux over a cube in 3D space, staring at it with tears in his eyes, softly whispering... Someday they'll get it."